Date: Wed, 09 Jun 1999 17:23:21 -0700 From: Jean Richter Subject: 6/9/99 P.E.R.S.O.N. Project news 1. U.S. Department of Education school locator web site 2. WA: Log Cabin Republicans help kill safe schools bill 3. WI: GLSEN awards honor students and teachers 4. Background info & guidance on new Supreme Court ruling ============================================================== From: SARATOGANY@aol.com Date: Tue, 25 May 1999 22:08:57 EDT Subject: US Dept. of Education School Locator (name, address, phone and more) Message from: The Coaliton for Safer Schools of NYS PO Box 2345 Malta, NY 12020 US Dept. of Education School Locator (on the Net) http://nces.ed.gov/ccdweb/school/school.asp To locate "public" schools in a county fill in county name and state in appropiate boxes. You will get the school name, address, and telephone number. By clicking on individual school name from your list you will get more detailed info about the school ie. race numbers. >From this information you can build your own database and then obtain the school fax number for each school. If you have PC fax software you can do a mass faxing. You can save on phone charges if you schedule your mass faxing for sometime after midnight (some software packages have a schedule option). John Myers Director of Operations and Programs PS: Also, while you are at the US Dept. of Education website you will find an area for publications and a category for SAFE SCHOOLS. Here you will find a small list of pubs you can order free (?) by calling toll free 1-800-USA-LEARN. ================================================================================= Date: Tue, 25 May 1999 19:18:35 -0700 Subject: Log Cabin Republicans foil safe schools bill in WA From: "Channel Q News" To: (LGBT Political Activists), queerpolitics@abacus.oxy.edu Log Cabin Republicans Foil safe schools bill by Michael Bradbury Seattle Gay News May 21, 1999 While Rep. Ed Murray's Safe Schools Bill has been on life support for months, an attempt to revive it as an amendment failed during the special legislative session when Log Cabin Republicans, Gay members of the Grand Old Party,expressed their concern to House Education Co-chair Gigi Talcott (R-28). "The Log Cabin Republicans oppose the bill and are working with Talcott" Murray said Wednesday. "If they are responsible for it not passing, that is absolutely reprehensible," he said. After introducing his safe schools amendment to a piece of passing education legislation late Tuesday, Murray hoped to add training for teachers and students about malicious harassment based on gender,ethnic background, religious conviction, sexual orientation or disability. But, Murray withdrew his amendment on Wednesday, after Talcott assured him that she would kill any education bill that had his amendment attached. "I can't be responsible for killing a good bill," Murray said. "And I can't kill legislation without fracturing the fragile coalition of conservative Democrats and moderate Republicans who support this bill," he said. After withdrawing his amendment from passing legislation, Murray conceded that his bill was dead for this session. "I will revive it next year, if I am in the legislature," he added. Log Cabin Republicans insist that they support what the bill does, but oppose its length. "I contacted Talcott to work with her to pare down Murray's bill," Marrell Livesay, Washington president of LCR, said. "It is not true that we were not support of the bill," he said, defending his position. "We did not get involved until this week, but the bill is just too broad." Whether LCR criticism of HB 1765 played a significant role in its demise, Murray argues it did,while Talcott said it had little to do with it. "My belief is there are many things we should do for education on the state level, but when you get to an area as sensitive as training students and staff on sexual issues, it is better left on the local level," Talcott said, admitting that there is nothing more that could have been done to sway her to pass this bill. "Individual school districts need to have the authority to carry on in a way that is sensitive to the needs of their communities, not have the state mandate what is required," she said, realizing that education is not possible in an environment where students do not feel safe. "Teachers need to have sensitivity training, but I refuse to impose my beliefs on all the students of the state. That's what school boards are tasked to do." At midnight Thursday, the House passed HB 2304, a substitute school safety bill introduced by Education co-chairs Dave Quall (D-40) and Talcott. "Achieving safe schools was truly one of the legislature's most important challenges of our special session," Quall said, sponsoring the $7 million package promoting school safety by hiring more security and developing intervention and prevention for districts dealing with at-risk or disruptive students. "Every student needs to feel safe, whether his or her lifestyle is supported by other students or not. Hatred and mean-spiritedness shouldn't have a place in our schools," Quall added. "The bill is dead. We failed," Murray conceded, having exhausted all options. "We support Ed's withdrawing the amendment because we don't want to see bills getting killed," Rich Pfouts, co-chair of Hands of Washington, a grassroots Gay political organization, said. "With a divided House, we knew it would be tough to get anything positive passed," he said,disappointed that there was not more progress based on the 65 co-sponsors of the bill. "Now is the time to move on and work on getting it passed next session." ***************************************************************** This message has been distributed as a free, nonprofit informational service, to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. Please do not publish, or post in a public place on the Internet, copyrighted material without permission and attribution. (Note: Press releases are fine to reprint. Don't reprint wire stories, such as Associated Press stories, in their entirety unless you subscribe to that wire service.) Forwarding of this material should not necessarily be construed as an endorsement of the content. In fact, sometimes messages from anti-gay organizations are forwarded as "opposition research." ================================================================================== Wisconsin State Journal, May 24, 1999 Box 8058,Madison,WI,53708 (Fax 608-252-6333 ) (E-MAIL: wsjopine@statejournal.madison.com ( http://www.madison.com/ ) STUDENTS WIN AWARD FROM TOLERANCE GROUP The Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network Sunday honored four high school seniors, two educators and one community member who have worked to make schools safer for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered students and staff. [Deleted article. filemanager@qrd.org] ================================================================================= From: SARATOGANY@aol.com Date: Tue, 25 May 1999 23:44:46 EDT Subject: Title IX: March 97 US Dept. of ED-OCR Guidance with Gay Issue Content Message from: The Coalition for Safer Schools of NYS PO Box 2345 Malta, NY 12020 On May 24, 1999 a US Supreme Court decission makes clear that school districts can be held liable for student on student "sexual harassment" under Title IX. Below is information from the US Dept. of Education: Office of Civil Rights regarding Title IX and sexual orientation issues with reference to the Jamie Nabozny case. John Myers Director of Operations and Programs ============================================================ US Department of Education: Office of Civil Right (OCR) March 13, 1997 TITLE IX Guidance (on the internet) (for full text go to) http://www.ed.gov/legislation/FedRegister/announcements/1997-1/031397b.html 03/13/97: Sexual Harrassment Guidance [OCR] Gay pertinent content excerpts from full text: Application of Guidance to Harassment Based on Sexual Orientation Comments: Several commenters indicated that, in light of OCR's stated policy that Title IX's prohibition against sexual harassment applies regardless of the sex of the harassed student or of the sex of the alleged harasser, the Guidance was confusing regarding the statement that Title IX does not apply to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Discussion: The Guidance has been clarified to indicate that if harassment is based on conduct of a sexual nature, it may be sexual harassment prohibited by Title IX even if the harasser and the harassed are the same sex or the victim of harassment is gay or lesbian. If, for example, harassing conduct of a sexual nature is directed at gay or lesbian students, it may create a sexually hostile environment and may constitute a violation of Title IX in the same way that it may for heterosexual students. The Guidance provides examples to illustrate the difference between this type of conduct, which may be prohibited by Title IX, and conduct constituting discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, which is not prohibited by Title IX. The Guidance also indicates that some State or local laws or other Federal authority may prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. =========================================================== Although Title IX does not prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation,14 sexual harassment directed at gay or lesbian students may constitute sexual harassment prohibited by Title IX. For example, if students heckle another student with comments based on the student's sexual orientation (e.g., ``gay students are not welcome at this table in the cafeteria''), but their actions or language do not involve sexual conduct, their actions would not be sexual harassment covered by Title IX. On the other hand, harassing conduct of a sexual nature directed toward gay or lesbian students (e.g., if a male student or a group of male students target a lesbian student for physical sexual advances) may create a sexually hostile environment and, therefore, may be prohibited by Title IX. It should be noted that some State and local laws may prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Also, under certain circumstances, courts may permit redress for harassment on the basis of sexual orientation under other Federal legal authority. (see 15 below) It is also important to recognize that gender-based harassment, which may include acts of verbal, nonverbal, or physical aggression, intimidation, or hostility based on sex, but not involving conduct of a sexual nature, may be a form of sex discrimination that violates Title IX if it is sufficiently severe, persistent, or pervasive and directed at individuals because of their sex.16 For example, the repeated sabotaging of female graduate students' laboratory experiments by male students in the class could be the basis of a violation of Title IX. Although a comprehensive discussion of gender-based harassment is beyond the scope of this Guidance, in assessing all related circumstances to determine whether a hostile environment exists, incidents of gender-based harassment combined with incidents of sexual harassment could create a hostile environment, even if neither the gender-based harassment alone nor the sexual harassment alone would be sufficient to do so. =========================================================== 15. See Nabozny v. Podlesny, 92 F.3d 446 (7th Cir. 1996) (holding that a gay student could maintain claims alleging discrimination based on both gender and sexual orientation under the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution in case in which school district officials allegedly failed to protect the student to the same extent that other students were protected from harassment and harm by other students due to the student's gender and sexual orientation). ============================================================================= Jean Richter -- richter@eecs.berkeley.edu The P.E.R.S.O.N. Project (Public Education Regarding Sexual Orientation Nationally) CHECK OUT OUR INFO-LOADED WEB PAGE AT: http://www.youth.org/loco/PERSONProject/